David Bullard’s Eternal September

I was both amused and alarmed by David Bullard’s column about blogs and bloggers in last week’s Sunday Times. It was all absolutely true, every word, so knowing what lay in store for him I sent some little psychic sachets of sterkte winging through the ethers, for him to keep in his pocket. I hope they’re coming in handy. But why would he want to engage with a not very subtle cabal of nitwits whose collective online oeuvre is concrete proof that some people should not have been allowed to learn reading and writing in the first place? Now he’s gone and nailed his foot to the funnyfarm floor by acquiring a blog of his own. Why would he do that? Like he said this week, “I should have kept my mouth shut.”

It’s not too late, Mr Bullard! Bail out immediately before they eat your brains. No-one is immune, not even you. Don’t feed the baboons for goodness sake. Get some calamine for that nasty rash and take comfort from the fact that they get bored really quickly and will move along any minute now.

But if you must pursue this folly against all advice, may I offer my services as Disemvoweller? You will need one for sure. The beauty of disemvowelling is that it’s not the same as censorship. It’s better. I’ve been dying to try it but have never had the opportunity here, all four of my readers being very well behaved indeed. I will charge you 1 cent per word or part thereof, the reason I have to charge is not because I’m after the money (although I’m anticipating it getting to a point where you offer me a rand a vowel just to keep me on) but because I’m after the job description. I’d quite like to be able to say, “I’m a Professional Disemvoweller” when people ask.